Deborah Western

Water policy, trust and governance in the Murray-Darling Basin

ABSTRACT Concerns for river health in the Murray-Darling Basin (MDB) area and shifting priorities for water use have led to a significant process of water reform over the last decade. The MDB area, also known as the food bowl of Australia, produces much of the countrys food and is home to a significant portion of the population. A long-term drought, historical over-allocation of water for irrigation and climate variability have led to mounting concerns about the long-term viability of the rivers. While the reform process has resulted in the Commonwealth government taking control of the rivers from the States, it has also been influenced by changes in governments and consequent shifts in water allocation priorities from a privileging of agriculture to a broader approach encompassing economic, environmental and social concerns. This had led to uncertainty for the people and communities in the Basin and some confusion between the various layers of governance structures. This paper presents the results of exploratory research conducted with key, high-level stakeholders involved in water reform to examine their perceptions of the evolving water policy process. Despite agreement amongst stakeholders that returning water to the environment to ensure river health is critical, our research reveals significant tensions between stakeholders concerning the evolving process, particularly centred on the potential social outcomes and fairness and equity. This suggests the need for more integrated and transparent governance structures, attention to levels of trust between partners and a common vision that incorporates environmental, economic and social goals.

Using the F-word: feminist epistemologies and postgraduate research

This article reports on the ways in which feminism has led to and influenced the unfolding of our three separate doctoral research journeys. In writing about this choice, we suggest that the epistemology of feminism is compatible with qualitative methods, as well as with the social work discipline, within which we all practice. The article reports on the impact of feminism on this journey from the perspective of three different stages of doctoral research, beginning, middle, and ending.

Gender-based Violence and Depression in Women

Introduction.- An introductory visit to a womens journaling group.- A conceptual and contextual background for theorising and understanding gender-based violence and depression in women.- Gender-based violence against women and human rights.- Depression in women.- Feminist group work, consciousness-raising and resistance.- Women and journaling.- The Womens Journaling Group Program (WJGP) model.- An example outline of a Womens Journaling Group Program.- Practice guidelines for facilitating a Womens Journaling Group Program.- Postscript.- Index.

Gender-based Violence Against Women and Human Rights

This chapter builds on the previous chapters by looking into more depth at some of the central concepts employed in this text. Gender-based violence against women is contextualised in more detail by reviewing key global definitions and estimations of the worldwide nature and frequency of this violence. Contributing factors to the occurrence and continuation of gender-based violence are presented within human rights and public health perspectives as introduced in Chap. 3. Ideas around the prevention and response to gender-based violence begin to take shape. A feminist group work response fits most obviously within a response intervention. However, with the focus of consciousness raising and resistance in the Women’s Journalling Group Programme, this group work response also contains elements of prevention and transformation within it.

Staff conceptualisations of elder abuse in residential aged care: A rapid review

The purpose of this rapid review was to explore how residential aged care staff conceptualise and identify elder abuse.

An Example Outline of a Women’s Journaling Group Program

What follows is a brief agenda and outline of the processes and activities within one example of a Women’s Journaling Group Program. This program could be facilitated over a period of a few weeks or concertinaed into one or two whole days. The narratives and threads that could be addressed in each activity are noted.

Practice Guidelines for Facilitating a Women’s Journaling Group Programme

This chapter provides practice guidelines for practitioners who are interested in undertaking journaling work with women and facilitating women’s journaling groups. The guidelines cover practice theory and knowledge as well as content and process issues that may arise when facilitating women’s journaling groups for women who have experienced gender-based violence and depression. The guidelines are informed by and based on the Women’s Journaling Group Programme model. As a result, the practice guidelines reflect and summarise themes and topics that have been discussed in the preceding chapters of this book. This material includes the experiences of depression and gender-based violence for women; the critical-feminist-intersectional theoretical understanding of depression and gender-based violence that underpins social work practice with women in the model; the role that journaling may play in women’s lives and recovery; the theory underpinning feminist group work; the frameworks, narratives and threads within the model and the methods and principles of consciousness-raising and resistance. Presenting the guidelines in this chapter—and at the conclusion of the book—brings this text towards a close. I hope the practice guidelines provide practical thoughts and ideas to enable practitioners to develop their own women’s journaling groups based on the model outlined in this book.

A Conceptual and Contextual Background for Gender-based Violence and Depression in Women

This chapter provides an overview of the central concepts in this text before a more in-depth exploration in later chapters. The central concepts are gender-based violence against women; the notion of gender; depression in women; human rights and public health frameworks; critical feminist theories; the concept of intersectionality and its contribution to critical feminist theoretical understandings and the links between violence against women and the subsequent development of depression in women. This overview also provides a context within which an understanding of the central concepts and of the rationale and underpinnings of the Women’s Journaling Group Programme model can be situated.

Women and Journaling

This chapter provides a short introduction to the practice of journaling. I explore the concept of journaling for therapeutic purposes and look briefly at some of the research into the effectiveness and impact of journaling, or at least expressive and therapeutic writing, on mental and physical health. The concept of narratives in therapeutic writing is introduced and some examination of the role that narratives play for women in understanding and recovering from traumatic events such as gender-based violence and mental illness such as depression is undertaken. The rationale for women’s journaling and the techniques that can be used are considered.

An Introductory Visit to a Women’s Journaling Group

This chapter provides a brief glimpse into a session of a Women’s Journaling Group where readers can gain a sense of how such a group might be facilitated and how journaling activities can be employed to explore women’s experiences of violence and depression.